


A Sweeter Song Tomorrow

by nagia



Category: Dragon Age
Genre: Alternate Timeline, F/M, slave AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-04-14
Updated: 2011-04-14
Packaged: 2017-10-18 02:21:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 3,033
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/183920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagia/pseuds/nagia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if the Hawke family had fled, from the gates of Kirkwall, to Minrathous? And what if Danarius hadn't yet lost Fenris when they arrived? A story of 'what-ifs' and maybes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. challenges, challenges

"Trust me, my dear, you'll all cooperate soon enough."

The magister's gaze sweeps down her, as if the lightning crackling around her fingertips is no more important than her cleavage.

Adder Hawke wants to wipe the sneering little smirk off his mouth. Actually, she wants to electrocute his face until his teeth chatter and his lips turn colors. But she'll settle for wiping that smirk away.

Mana buzzes through her veins. Lightning crackles and races along her other hand.

The light-eyed woman standing behind the magister gasps. Her grip on a leather lead shifts and Hawke looks away from the apparent slave's eyes, tries to make eye contact with the magister.

But the magister only raises his chin and laughs.

"Is that a challenge, little bird?" The sneer-smirk curves wickedly. "You'd make the other half of the nicest matched hunting pair..."

Her lightning crackles like breaking glass. She extends her hand in the challenge she's seen a few other magisters give.

Danarius's gaze slides to encompass Carver and Aveline. "Or perhaps even a pair of your Fereldan mabari. Two different hunting pairs -- what could make a man happier?"

She hears Aveline draw in a sharp breath behind her. The former knight cracks her knuckles. And Carver's grip on his hammer makes the handle creak.

"Let me, Hawke."

"Can't cast spells if your head's pulp."

But Hawke only takes a step forward. "I have challenged you, Magister Danarius, by right of magic and kinship to the Imperium."

Fury flits across his face, quickly erased to impassivity. "Fenris. I want her heart."

The leash falls to the floor.

She doesn't have time to think. One instant, she's trying to figure out what Danarius is playing at. The next she's damn near tripping over herself to get out of the way of a fast-moving blue blur.

The heat in his eyes, the vivid green, keeps her standing still. All she sees is those green eyes and a gauntleted hand, glowing blue.

She drops the lightning and clenches her fists, throwing stone forward without bothering to aim.

She hears ribs crack. The slave reels backward, his back striking the wall. He's perfectly still a moment before surging smoothly to his feet.

Before he can charge her again, Hawke steps toward Danarius. She raises one hand over her head, lets mana and lightning flow. The other hand, she uses to reach out to Danarius.

"I am Addelaide Hawke, born to Leandra Amell, and I have challenged _you_ , Danarius."

None of his little friends had even looked up from their divans. But the name _Amell_ draws attention.

"I hear and witness," one of them says.

Danarius glares at her. He's silent for a long moment, until the group behind him begins to murmur. When he speaks, his words come slowly, as if he has to force each one.

"I hear your challenge and accept it."


	2. death defying

Adder crouches in the dueling ring, picks up a handful of sand. The Veil is thin, here; the sand runs through her fingers, ready to soak up yet more blood.

She looks up and around the outside of the ring. Her mother, Carver, and Aveline stand on her side of the ring. A bored-looking magister stands with them.

On Danarius's side of the ring, she sees the light-eyed brunette from the day of the challenge. Just as before, the brunette holds the leash of a white-haired slave. The same one who glowed?

There's no telling from this distance.

She opens with a spell of petrification. Between the thinned Veil and all the sand, she has but to slap her hands together and shift her weight properly. The spell leaves Danarius encased in stone.

She follows that with lightning. First, from afar. It jolts through him, writhes white and blue over him, trailing violet afterimages.

Then from closer range. Her hand touches his skin. Light whispers up her wrists, travels along her arms. Her own mana buzzes in her head and at her fingertips, and she sees the pain in his eyes.

If he could scream, he would.

She's not even permitted to cut his throat.


	3. riches as reward

That's how she finds herself staring at a veritable fortress. A fortress of gleaming white marble, with luxurious red tapestries hanging from the walls.

Behind her, Carver whistles.

"It's certainly defensible," Aveline says.

Yes. It's certainly that.


	4. the cage unveiled

"I am Titus," the too-thin man says. He goes down on one knee, his head bowed. "I filled the role of steward and overseer."

"Filled the role?" She can't stop the quip. "What, did Danarius kill and eat the last one, and just not bother to replace him?"

The brunette gasps again. Adder casts her an irritated glance. One would think she'd learn not to be surprised at what the mad Fereldan woman does.

Titus only looks sadly at her. "I was a debtor," he says, almost too quietly for her to hear.

By 'was a debtor,' he means 'am a slave.'

The wave of nausea she feels at the thought tell her she's going to fix that.

But first to get the crazy, slave-owning brunette (and why is she named Little Wolf? She's more like a mouse or a rabbit) out of her house. The sight of that leash makes her feel even more ill than Titus's comment about being a debtor.

"You," she says, pointing to the brunette. The brunette startles again, and Adder says, "Fenris or whatever your name is, leave. I have to deal with this."

"My name isn--"

"--I don't care. Get out."

The brunette goes in a flutter of azure silk, glaring all the while. The leashed slave follows behind her. Sorrow so intense she can barely name it curves his lips downward, narrows his eyes.

If she could, she'd free him, too.


	5. the cage door opened

"What are you going to do about them all? You don't plan on keeping them, do you?" Leandra Hawke smooths her dress reflexively.

Aveline shifts the way she leans against the desk. Her mail chimes, softly. "And yet you can't just set them loose, either, can you? If you save a life, you're responsible for it."

"We're not keeping _slaves_ ," Carver says. His tone has gone hard.

They don't see eye-to-eye about much. It doesn't always matter. But if they can't agree about this...

Adder wants to tear out her hair. Titus barely remembers the concept of a salary, and none of the other slaves have ever received one.

"I'll free the ones who want freeing, I guess, and just tell them they're welcome to work here as servants."

From the expression on Carver's face, that doesn't make him much happier.


	6. mistakes

Two days pass. Adder spends most of them locked in Danarius's study, going over his finances. Her conversational Arcanum has gotten better in the past months, though she's best with rote phrases. She's still barely literate in the spidery runes.

Every now and then, Titus has to help her sound out words.

She finally settles exactly how Danarius acquired his wealth. He never bothered with the slave trade; it's old, deeply entrenched, extremely violent. Not a kind business for beginners.

No. He peddled lyrium to the Templars.

"And what is this ledger?"

Titus barely glances up from the letters she has him sorting through. "His accounts with slavers. Which reminds me, mistress."

"Hawke works just fine," she replies automatically.

"Which reminds me, Mistress Hawke, one of your slaves is missing. I believe the magister's apprentice has him in her," and here he pauses, before saying, delicately, "keeping."

"The whose who has who in her what?" It's an automatic question, phrased in a way that would have put Carver on a tear. Arcanum makes it sound even worse than it would have in Kingstongue.

Titus blinks. It takes him a moment to piece her question together, and then he says, "Hadriana, Mistress Hawke. You sent her away with one of your slaves still in her possession."

She doesn't like to think of any of them as hers. But there's only one person she's sent away.

"You mean the brunette in blue with the bad case of the vapors?"

"You called her Fenris."

Her heart freezes in her chest.

The woman with the green-eyed slave. She could have ordered that leash taken off. She could have saved him.

She has to fix this.


	7. retrieval

A frightened slave -- one so constantly frightened he never even bothered with her name -- shows in the new magister and her two non-mage companions.

The sudden tension in Hadriana's body thrums along the leash and to his throat. Fenris looks up only long enough to see her hand reaching for him. Rather than risk his eyes to her nails, he drops his head again and permits her to run her hand through his hair.

"Magister Hawke," Hadriana says, and he can hear the wicked curve of her lips in her voice. He can tell from the way she represses a shiver that it's fake. "What brings you to me?"

The redheaded woman standing behind Magister Hawke narrows her eyes, while the manchild who resembles her cracks his knuckles.

And the new magister -- Magister Hawke -- holds out one hand, palm up. Lightning crackles.

For the first time in his short memory, he sees Hadriana show fear of someone other than Danarius. It's a flash in her eyes, the sudden scratch of her nails against his scalp, but he sees it nonetheless. And almost forgives this Magister Hawke for permitting this hateful woman to hold his leash unsupervised for so long.

Danarius was rarely quite so cruel.

"Stop dancing around it," Magister Hawke says. "You know why I am here."

"I honestly can't imagine why a humble apprentice --"

"Humble _nothing_ ," the Magister snaps. "You are a hissing snake and know it."

The snake comment, he suspects, is an attempt at rendering a Fereldan sentiment into Arcanum. If it's a metaphor, it's not translating.

"I'm afraid I don't know what you mean."

The Magister actually growls. She sounds like an angry dog, not the hunting bird Danarius threatened to make of her.

"I want his leash now," she says, when she bothers with words. Her lightning hisses at them like the snake the Magister called Hadriana.

He chances another look up at Danarius's apprentice. At her dumbfounded expression, he dips his head again to hide the beginnings of his smile.

"I can't simply give it to you," Hadriana stalls.

The lightning hisses again, flares white and leaves purple burns in the air when he blinks. The mana in the room leads his tattoos to flare for an instant.

"I have met vile persons in travel, but you steal the pastry."

Certainly Hadriana stole him, but did Magister Hawke just call him a pastry? His beginning dislike of this woman cements itself.

"I think they never say _take the cake_ in Imperium, sister," the manchild says.

The Magister looks at them for a beat and then sighs. "I suppose not. I mean you are the vilest, Hadriana. Give me the leash, or I will kill you."

The threat and the lightning convince Hadriana. She drops her hold on his leash and motions him toward the magister. He goes, reluctantly. Kneels at her feet with his head bowed.

Hatred begins here.

But the instant he's in reach, she crouches to pull the leash and collar from his throat. Both leash and collar hit the ground between the Magister and Hadriana.

"Burn it," the Magister growls.

He can only stare up at her. She asked for it, asked for him, and now she wants the leash burned? Will she have _him_ burned?

"The slave is beyond price, Magister," Hadriana says.

"I have said _it_ , not _him_. Burn the leash, or die the same as Danarius." A pause. The Magister's lips curl into an expression almost as wicked as Hadriana's was, moments ago. "The exact same."

Hadriana burns the leash. Her eyes are large, liquid, and her lower lip trembles as she does so. It's a surreal sight; he half-wonders if this is some dream. He has seen slaves cry, and servants, but he did not think magisters could.

Not even apprentices. Especially not Hadriana.

"We will leave now. You do not follow. You do not approach my home." Magister Hawke pauses. "You know what I will do."

"You'll kill me. I gathered." Hadriana is trying to sound dry, bored, but he knows her voice too well to be fooled. She may fool the Magister, however.


	8. baby steps

The new magister doesn't say a word until the gates to Danarius's estate have closed behind them.

When she finally does speak, her words are in the Common Tongue of the Free Marches and Ferelden: "Aveline, Carver, I think I'd better handle this alone."

The redhead's gaze traces the claws on his gauntlets before finding the sword strapped to his back.

"If you're sure, Hawke."

"I'm sure," Magister Hawke says.

The redhead and the magister's brother retreat. The magister leads him through Danarius's tapestry-laden halls.

They stop in Danarius's study. In the two days he spent with Hadriana, she's transformed it. She piled half the books into crates labelled, in cramped Common writing, _Burn_. Though he scans the room for them, he doesn't see Danarius's anatomic models or obsidian bleeding knives.

Titus sits at the desk, poring over a ledger. He jumps up instantly, nearly knocking over the low stool in his haste.

"My apologies, mistress, I was simply finishing --"

The magister waves a hand, slipping back into her very bad Arcanum. "No need for apologies. I had no need of the chair, Titus."

"Even so, Mistress Hawke, I should never have presumed."

She snorts. "No more fretting, Titus. But I think Fenris and I are needing some privacy. Could you please have a meal brought for him, thank you?"

"Nothing for yourself, Mistress Hawke?"

The magister only waves her hand again; Titus leaves quickly, apparently not willing to risk her good graces.

The friendliness leaves him instantly suspicious.

The magistrate points at the stool. "Sit."

He sits. Strange, but he's almost grateful for the order amidst the false pleasantries. She'll show her true colors soon enough. She'll have to.

"Fenris," she sighs. "What ought I do with you?"

He doesn't bother to answer. She'll do what any magister would do in her place, he's sure. Even if she's barbaric, she's got a certain amount of animal cunning; she'll find a use for him.

They all have.

"No suggestion? No request for freedom?"

"What good would that do me?" He slides into the Common Tongue, because her Arcanum is ear-gouging.

The look of surprise on her face makes it even more worth it.

But she switches languages as well. "Well, to start, you could track down Hadriana and kill her. You could leave the Imperium. Live your own life."

"Why bother? I'd simply be enslaved by another magister the instant you set me free." If she'd even actually grant his request, which he strongly doubts.

A troubled look crosses her face. She looks down.

"I… if you truly don't want it," she says, softly, "then I won't try and force it on you. But I don't want to _own_ you, Fenris."

That startles a bitter laugh out of him, and his laughter makes her frown.

"I'm being serious. I'd rather just hire you. Not that I even know what I'd be hiring you _for_."

"Indentured servitude? A vast improvement, I'm sure."

Her eyes flash. They're a blue so pale they look gray.

That expression brings him into line. The simplest use of mana could cause his markings to react. Painfully. And she displayed no hold on her temper with Hadriana.

"I was Danarius's bodyguard," he says. "Yours, now."

She opens her mouth to reply, but a tiny, light-haired slave raps on the door frame.

"Mistress Hawke? You requested a meal for Fenris."

* * *


	9. deep breath

He follows her to her room. Adder can't say she cares for the way he's exactly three steps behind her. But more than that, his attitude toward freedom baffles her.

The other slaves have met the offer with suspicion. Of course they've met it with suspicion. But it was suspicion born of at least some kind of want. Open hostility to the idea of being free? And it's not even as if he wants to remain with her.

It's staring at the available furniture in the room that a new fact hits her.

"You say you were never more than two paces away from Danarius? Never?"

"I was not," he confirms.

"Where did you _sleep_?"

He stares at her like she's a blathering idiot. Maybe she _is_ a blathering idiot. She blames this whole 'owning a bodyguard' fiasco.

"I slept on the floor."

"Right. Well. That can't continue."

He watches her for all of an instant as she strips half the pillows from her bed, and a pile of furs, and one of the three luxurious coverlets. These Tevinters have no idea what cold is, if they think these balmy nights need that many linens.

And then he takes the pile of blankets and pillows from her. He stands before her, clearly unsure of what she's doing with them, but for some reason unwilling to let her do any kind of work.

She points to a couch in the far corner. "If you want to sleep in here, you're sleeping on that."

He looks down at the pile in his hands, then over at the couch, then finally at her.

"Take them," she says, as gently as she can when she wants to have throttled Danarius the instant he even thought of enslaving this man. "They're for you. Get some sleep."

"But you're still awake."

"I'll be abed soon enough," she tells him.

Later, after she snuffs the candles and strips herself — both of these over his protests; apparently snuffing candles and undressing their masters is what slaves are for — she listens to him breathe in the quiet. His breaths are even, measured, but it's not the evenness of sleep.

The thought of him curled up on her floor makes her chest hurt.

They're listening to each other breathe, she realizes. They're the bare length of a room away, in the dark, and yet they each manage to be alone.


End file.
